June 22, 2015 UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -
Penn State student-athletes Matt Brown (wrestling) and Nia Grant (women's volleyball) have been selected the Nittany Lions' 2014-15 Big Ten Medal of Honor recipients.
The duo joins the nearly 1,400 student-athletes across the conference as recipients of this prestigious honor over the past 100 years.
The Big Ten's most exclusive award was the first of its kind in intercollegiate athletics to recognize academic and athletic excellence. The Big Ten Medal of Honor was first awarded in 1915 to one student-athlete from the graduating class of each university who had "attained the greatest proficiency in athletics and scholastic work."
In 1982, the award was expanded to include one female student-athlete from each member institution. Among the nearly 9,500 student-athletes competing at Big Ten programs, only 28 earn this proud distinction on an annual basis.
Brown and Grant join an elite group of previous Penn State Big Ten Medal of Honor award winners, including: Helen Holloway, women's basketball, 1994; John Amaechi, men's basketball, 1995; Jeff Hartings, football, 1996; Kim McGreevy, women's cross country/track and field, 1998; Katie Futcher, women's golf, 2004; Joanna Lohman, women's soccer, 2005; Jason Yeisley, men's soccer, 2010; Petra Januskova, women's tennis, 2013 and John Urschel, football, 2013.
Earlier this spring, Brown and Grant were named recipients of the 2015 Ernest B. McCoy Memorial Award, which is presented annually to one Penn State senior male and one senior female student-athlete who have combined successful athletic participation with academic excellence.
Brown became Penn State's 24th three-time All-American this past March as he rolled to the 174 pound championship at the NCAA Championships. Brown posted a 29-3 record this past season. He capped off his career with a 5-0 run through the NCAA Championships to claim his first individual crown and leaves Penn State with a 118-16 career record, 12th all-time in wins and 11th all-time in pins with 30. Brown rolled to a 14-1 dual meet record this year, including a perfect 9-0 mark in Big Ten duals. All told, Brown will leave Penn State with 118 wins, 44 dual meet victories, 23 Big Ten dual wins, 30 pins, 11 tech falls, 35 majors and 196 dual meet points. Brown placed first, second and fifth at nationals and was a two-time national finalist for Coach Cael Sanderson. Brown leaves Penn State a member of three NCAA Championship and three Big Ten Championship teams and competed in the NWCA All-Star Classic once and was Penn State's 2015 Big Ten Sportsmanship Award winner for wrestling.
Brown was recently named Penn State's Male Student-Athlete of the Year for 2014-15. He was also selected as the CoSIDA Men's At-Large Academic All-American of the Year after earning his second first-team CoSIDA Academic All-America honor. A criminology and international studies major, he was also recently honored with a prestigious NCAA Post-Graduate Scholarship and was Penn State's male recipient of this year's Big Ten Post-Graduate Scholarship. He was one of four Nittany Lion wrestlers to earn first team NWCA National All-Academic laurels as well (the third time he has been honored as such). He was also recently named Penn State's male recipient of the McCoy Award and was also a 2013 first-team CoSIDA Academic All-American. The 2013 Elite 89 Award Winner as the nation's top wrestling student-athlete, Brown was a three-time Academic All-Big Ten honoree as well.
Grant, who is majoring in communications, completed her career at Penn State this past fall, having helped the Nittany Lion women's volleyball team to back-to-back NCAA national championship titles in 2013-14. She also highlighted the season with her second career AVCA honor, having garnered honorable mention distinction in 2013. Grant earned her first career Big Ten postseason accolade in 2014 with a unanimous selection to the All-Big Ten team, while also picking up her second consecutive AVCA All-Northeast Region honor.
Having led the conference and the nation in hitting percentage for most of the season, her team-high .431 hitting efficiency concluded the year ranked first in the conference and fourth nationally. She closed out her four-year career at Penn State ranked eighth all-time with a .381 career hitting efficiency. Her 466 total blocks also ranks 12th in the PSU record book.
Grant is a three-time Academic All-Big Ten selection, who also earned 2013-14 Big Ten Distinguished Scholar-Athlete honors.